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It is uncommon to witness a band change the course of a style in actual time. But we’ve watched Sleep Token rise from the shadows to promoting out The O2, cracking the US Billboard charts, and dragging steel – and all its expectations – with them.
After all, fame brings stress. Sleep Token’s fourth studio album arrives not simply on main label RCA and with much more hype, however with the added weight of scrutiny, particularly from followers who noticed 2023’s Take Me Again To Eden as their magnum opus. And but, Even In Arcadia isn’t an album of anthems; it’s a patchwork woven from of introspection, stress and the anxiousness of stardom, all stitched collectively whereas the highlight burns. It presents one thing that’s extra commercially conscious, but additionally extra vitriolic, and way more intimate.
That intimacy comes from the lyrics, stripped again and unfiltered, as if the shine of fame has worn skinny. The place Take Me Again To Eden cloaked its anguish in fantasy, Even In Arcadia leans into confession. Caramel glides on a reggaeton pulse with the road ‘I suppose that’s what I get for attempting to cover within the limelight’, whereas Damocles is much more brittle as Vessel shrugs, ‘I do know these chords are boring’, like somebody circling author’s block however too burnt out to battle it.
Infinite Baths goes deepest, although, with a guitar line that recollects Shine On You Loopy Diamond – Pink Floyd’s tribute to founding vocalist Syd Barrett, who parted methods with Floyd when fame started to unravel him.
But when the lyrics flip inward, the music seems out. Sleep Token are masters of genre-splicing, however right here the shifts typically really feel strategic. Supplier is full-blown Usher cosplay, and Harmful is Careless Whisper for the BookTok era– all low-rider lure beats that hit with extra groove than Vessel’s six-pack.
It’s ridiculous, and but someway one of many album’s most memorable moments. The outcomes really feel dialled-up, even calculated, besides on Emergence, the place lure pop rhythms, vocoder vocals and hip hop cadences mix into one thing extra fluid and purposeful.
Nonetheless, it’s not all slow-burns and smooth edges. When Sleep Token go heavy, they go for the throat. There’s no direct successor to a monitor like Ascensionism, however Look To Windward – a reference to T.S. Elliot’s epic 1922 poem The Waste Land, and the legal guidelines of unintended penalties – provides it a rattling good run as a spiralling, Ihsahn-adjacent extravaganza that burns by means of grief and grandeur earlier than crash-landing right into a lure beat.
Infinite Baths additionally vies for epic standing, all smooth keys and gospel glow, rising by means of lush, Deftones-like swells earlier than collapsing into the heaviest, most punishing finale the band have ever recorded. The title monitor is simply as expansive, constructing like thunder by means of cinematic piano and strings, however as a substitute of delivering the anticipated blow, it retreats. Perhaps that’s the purpose.
Even In Arcadia gained’t win over anybody already rolling their eyes. It’s an intense, flawed and infrequently beautiful file that exhibits Sleep Token laid naked and exhausted, but in addition courageous, formidable and painfully trustworthy.
It’d divide longtime followers, however it’ll virtually definitely expose steel to its greatest viewers but. You don’t have to love Sleep Token. You don’t even have to grasp them. However at this level, ignoring them is not an possibility.
Even In Arcadia is out Friday Could 9. Learn the story of the band’s early years within the new challenge of Steel Hammer, out now, that includes two unique covers. Order your copy right here
